New Entrepreneur Eats Blue Cheese Dressing

ORLANDO

Pulling into the parking lot of the restaurant two-minutes late, I see a small framed, young man, wearing a faded polo shirt and khaki shorts with worn-out tennis shoes. Atop his dirty-blonde hair of head sits a khaki baseball cap. He is talking on his cell phone. Just then my cell phone buzzes to let me know that I have voicemail waiting. It’s him. It’s the man I am going to interview about being an entrepreneur. He’s left a message telling me that he’s checked the restaurant, and since I’m not there yet, I must be late. “Thank you, Sherlock,” I thought to myself as I approached the boyish figure in front of the diner. I instinctively put my hand out and identified myself, to which he replied, “Brad Littlejohn,” with a firm handshake.

I must admit that this was not what I was expecting. Here we are about to have a meeting and this business owner is wearing something that would be more appropriate at some rowdy college bar on a Saturday night. I give him the benefit of the doubt and we get sat at a table. He orders a healthy and conservative tuna wrap with two soufflé cups of blue cheese dressing on the side. I get an unhealthy Ruben sandwich with extra cheese. We each make an obvious passing of judgment about each other’s food order as we both raise eyebrows and sigh, almost in sync. OK, time to get out the pen and paper and get this show on the road!

THE STORY BEHIND THE BUSINESS

Randy: You’ve got a startup in Central Florida. What exactly is Shifting Paradigms (SP) about?

Brad: Basically, I got tired of conventional wisdom ruling my life. You know, work 40+ hours a week, pay your bills, save what’s left over, retire at 65, and live off social security. That sort of thing. So I got together with some friends and brainstormed ideas of how we could change our lifestyle. And it hit us that very wealthy people don’t make money like the rest of us. They focused on or lived a life of passive income. They realized that if they had enough streams of income coming from a variety of sources that could cover the expenses of their lifestyle, then they wouldn’t have to work as much, or as hard, or as frequently as the majority of people out there do. Think about people with rental properties. Shifting Paradigms is basically a company invested in looking at, researching, and trying out different ways to make passive income.

Randy: Why did you need a business for that? Couldn’t you do that on your own?

Brad: Yes. But many people incorporate themselves. Just look at some of the company names out there like “John Smith, LLC.” People are doing this because they want to manage their personal finances like a business. I think it’s pretty smart. So that’s what me and my business partners did. Except we get to divide the investment costs and profits. But most importantly is that we’re looking longer term, down the road. We want to be able to establish some sort of business credit now because we know that we will be getting involved in bigger projects down the road. We want to position ourselves to take advantage of branding opportunities, have some credibility, and to make it easier for future investors or business partners to join us on new ventures. We wanted to start a formal business sooner than later.

THE PROJECTS

R: What is SP currently involved in?

B: We’re a new company, but right off the bat, before we formed an LLC (limited liability company), we had a small website that sold T-shirts with logos of our blog site, Mangrove Root Gang (MRG).

R: I see that your hat has the Mangrove Root Gang logo on it. Looks pretty cool.

B: Thanks. We actually had the blog site before we started SP as a business. Now we’re looking at writing books, investing in real estate, setting up new blog sites, and other things that will generate passive income.

R: OK. I think I understand. But can you elaborate a little more on why you needed to form a company?

B: We wanted to have a professional outlet for sharing ideas with others. Forming the LLC also gave us some protection with the name of the company. We liked the name, because we felt it represented who we are, what we’ve been through, and what we do. Every day our thinking changes about how we look at the world in terms of how it operates, how happiness is achieved, how wealth is created, and how personal growth develops. The closer we look, the more we realize things don’t have to be the way we were always taught to believe how things should be. We don’t have to work for someone else and we don’t have to retire at 65. Conventional wisdom is a real downer. Seeing things differently caused huge paradigm shifts in our mentality, hence, the name.

R: So have you left your job yet? Any money from the business? You’re a psychotherapist, correct?

B: I still work full time. I’m in a management position for a private company that provides counseling and behavioral modification services for families. The business, like I said, is still in its early stages. We’re generating revenue, just not enough to live off of yet. It’s basically going towards recouping the initial capital investments. It’s only been about two months, but the opportunities are growing and new doors are opening all the time. That’s what I like about being your own boss. It’s a sense of accomplishment and knowing that what you’re doing can really take off. For now, I’m handling most of the bookkeeping for the company, as well as overseeing the plans for current and future projects. I’m also trying to get more blogging done.

SHARING THE KNOWLEDGE

R: Speaking of blogging, how is that venture going for you?

B: We like how [Mangrove Root Gang] has developed. We’re still in the early stages of deciding what looks best here and there on the actual web page, but those are kind of minor points. The content is good; actually really good. Some of my colleagues in the psych field have read it and like what is being offered.

R: What do you blog about?

B: It’s basically a personal growth site slash anti-conventional wisdom site. We blog about how to change your thinking, foster relationships, and we use it as an outlet to announce SP projects. The main focus of MRG is on personal growth via forming new relationships, acquiring new life perspective, and creating passive income opportunities. We share this through blog posts. I think that we will be starting up a few more blog sites with different content and focuses.

R: How did you come up with the name “mangroverootgang.com”?

B: One of the co-founders who had the idea for the blog said it very eloquently. I’m going to butcher it, but I’ll do my best to paraphrase. He likened personal growth to that of a mangrove, you know that tree that grows in the salty brackish waters in Florida. This tree grows in harsh, salty, and sometimes dry environments. It has many roots to sustain its life. It branches out in many different directions as it grows. It’s a great metaphor for personal growth. The “gang” part derives from what gangs are: groups of people with a like mindset that regularly meet. We have associates and colleagues who believe in the same things we do, especially personal growth. Therefore, he called it the Mangrove Root Gang blog. I really like it, and we’ve been told that the logo design is pretty catchy.

THE REALITY OF BUSINESS

R: What aspects of starting up a business has been the hardest?

B: Originally, we thought the costs would be a huge obstacle. But since we’ve been brainstorming from a passive income and unconventional wisdom perspective, it hasn’t been much of problem. We look for ways to start projects with little to no money up front. Pooling our financial resources has been helpful, as well. But I can see that bigger ventures in the future will require more capital. Time factors are an issue, too, both from wanting to spend more time on projects, and from waiting to see how things turn out. Researching project options is also time consuming.

R: You mentioned “bigger” ventures.

B: Real estate. That’s one of our main projects on the table right now. We eventually want to have some rental properties, but are looking into unconventional paths like lease-options.

R: Sounds like it will take some time, especially since this is all pretty new.

B: Yeah, but we’re always researching and testing things out on paper. That’s important for any business. Planning. Hopefully, we’ll be doing more implementing soon rather than planning. Implementation is key to success. You’ve got to go out and just do it. Nothing ever got done just thinking about it. That’s how wealth and lucrative ventures happen. Create a sound, basic idea of what you want to do, where you want to be, and then just do it. Thinking too much will cause you to question yourself or even talk yourself out of a golden opportunity. We don’t want that to happen. If we did that, we’d be back where we started. We’d be back in the world of conventional wisdom working for a paycheck every two weeks. That’s what we’re trying to get away from. At this point, we are more than willing to go through trial and error and to accept plenty of failure to achieve our goals.

R: That the mindset of winners, isn’t it.

B: Well, look at people like Trump, for example. He started out low, then went high, then went low again in the late 80’s, now he’s back on top. People who don’t understand how wealth is created, or how the principles behind passive income operate ultimately lose everything. Think of the stories you’ve heard about lottery winners who won millions, but lost it all. That’s because they were still operating from a conventional wisdom point of view. They did not have the respect for money nor the discipline to learn how to create more wealth. They felt the need to spend every cent they had – like many people today who work for a paycheck, but feel the urge to spend every cent. No matter how much they make, they spend and spend. They get a raise, they spend more. It’s almost mindless how people operate. I know; I was one of them. But that’s what we hope people will get from our ventures: information. We hope that people will learn from our mistakes because we plan to blog much of what goes on at SP. We also hope that people will initiate some of the changes we made in our own lives in theirs.

R: It’s an honorable thing that you’ve set out to do, then. Create wealth and personal growth opportunities and share the info with others.

B: It’s important that people learn to do this. I wish that I learned this in college, but as we know, there aren’t many opportunities to take entrepreneurial classes. It’s just not taught in our schools.

R: Maybe that’s an avenue that SP will explore.

B: We’re open to ideas. Teaching has been a goal of mine for years. I’d like to give it a shot as soon as SP really gets off the ground.

R: As a final question, what do you like about what you’re doing?

B: I think it basically boils down to having a sense or a certain degree of control. I’m in charge of my life and I want to lead myself to where I want to be. I can’t do that with a conventional job, even now. My time is committed to my employer for 50 hours a week. But even this startup has opened new doors and new ways of looking at things. Even though I personally can’t devote 100% of my time currently, I still benefit from the adoption of new life principles. I like that feeling. I know that I’ve grown as an individual just because I am willing to be unconventional. My mind now sees opportunities where I used to see obstacles. I get excited when a new idea sounds viable. It’s really a refreshing feeling when I’m involved with SP. It’s like a break from the everyday routine with potential benefits. And those benefits are things like the potential to make new relationships, and exchange ideas and information.

IT’S A WRAP

R: I wish you and your business much success. Thanks for taking the time to chat.

B: No problem. Next time, I’ll have an even bigger story for you.

As we got up from the table, Littlejohn picks up the bill. He pays the server, walks out, turns on his cell phone, places a call, gets in his car and drives off. I later received as email from him thanking me for the opportunity to interview him. That’s a classy guy; a true professional. I truly wish him well on his ventures. It’s nice to know that there are genuinely good people out there trying to change their lives. I think that it’s ok to make a few bucks doing it, as long as they don’t hurt anyone. And his business and goals, including sharing the knowledge of professional and personal growth with others, are admirable ones. That’s a good thing!

The writer is a retired psychotherapist, a registered nurse, and a budding entrepreneur.